Assembled Ford 9-Inch Third Member, 35-Spline Full Spool, Lite

• Hand-assembled by our professional technicians in house for quality control
• Correct backlash, preload, and pinion shimming to ensure optimal gear pattern
• Nodular iron housing is stronger than OEM “gray” iron and includes 4 lbs. of additional reinforcement
• Large “Daytona” style pinion bearing supports additional strength and reliability
• Solid pinion spacer and shim setup maintains pinion depth versus traditional crush sleeve
• Lightweight forged chromoly steel full size spool for maximum traction
• Ring and pinion gears use long-wearing 8620 cold-rolled steel
• Lightened gear options available (call to inquire)
• Ring gears assembled with Grade 9 hardware, which is 15 percent stronger than Grade 8
• Viton® pinion seal installed, which is resistant to chemicals and high temperatures
• Grade 8 carrier cap bolts for enhanced strength and reduced deflection
• Lock-style pinion nut with pre-applied Loctite®Daytona pinion support installed with Grade 5 bolts
• Includes form fitted, reusable red poly shipping/storage case

An Assembled Ford 9-Inch Third Member Ready For Your Racing Needs

Ford’s 9-inch is the undisputed king of performance rear axles for most any racing you can imagine, but there’s nowhere the Ford 9-inch is more popular than in drag racing. The brute strength of a properly built 9-inch with premium performance internals can take substantial amounts of power and easily transfer it to the track surface through slicks or drag radials. Combine that strength with the 9-inch housing’s ease of gear change ability via a drop out 9-inch 3rd member (or 9-inch center section as some refer to it) means racers can easily change gear ratios to suit their power level or track length (1/4-mile vs 1/8-mile). Our nodular iron Ford 9-inch center section 35-spline with lightened chromoly steel spool and Daytona pinion support is the perfect choice to ensure your drag car makes it across the finish line first.

A Nodular Iron 3rd Member That Can Take The Abuse, Launch After Launch

Each one of our racing Ford 9-inch 3rd member 35-spline builds begin with our nodular iron case, which resists deflection under load and handles the stress of higher horsepower without breaking a sweat! This foundation we build upon allows us to create a brute strength 9-inch ford center section for your racing needs. Additional material (over four pounds of additional ductile iron!) and reinforcement webbing built into the casting provides additional reinforcement. Along with the use of the heavier nodular iron material, thick forged steel bearing caps that use larger 3.25-inch carrier bearings and are secured by Grade 8 carrier cap bolts and billet steel adjusters, which means you have the strongest starting point possible for your 9-inch 3rd member. Precision machined surfaces provide for exacting fitment of sub-components and a leak free mounting of the Ford 9-inch center section to your 9-inch axle housing. Just add your 35-spline axles to complete your upgrade!

Your Choice of Gear Ratio Using 8620 Cold-Rolled Steel Gear Sets

While a strong foundation is a great start, you also need strong internals to ensure that your 9-inch can put the power to the pavement repeatedly, race after race, without giving up on you when you need it most. To that end our ring and pinion gears of choice are the Richmond EXCel gear sets. These gears are machined from 8620 cold-rolled steel for strength and long life. We offer these ring and pinion gears in ratios from 3.50:1 to 5.14:1 to suit your racing needs and they are installed onto our forged chromoly steel full spool that is CNC machined for a precision fit and to reduce weight for maximum traction to both rear tires. The strength of the forged chromoly steel spool means the ring gear has a more rigid mounting surface (the ring gear is also secured by stronger Grade 9 hardware with a tensile strength of 180,000 psi, a 15% increase over Grade 8 hardware).

The pinion gear sits in a heavy duty “Daytona” pinion support with larger than stock tapered roller bearings and we use a solid spacer with shims to set and maintain the pinion depth vs an OEM-style crush sleeve. The OEM crush sleeve can allow ring and pinion gear pattern changes under hard use by allowing changes to the pinion depth preload because the crush washer crushes further under these heavy loads. Also included is a high temperature Viton® pinion seal that retains its elasticity up to 399°F (204°C) and intermittently up to 600°F (316°C). This high temperature seal helps eliminate pinion leaks, reduces maintenance, and keeps the third member properly lubricated. A carrier-to-housing gasket is available separately to aid in installation of your new 3rd member.

Hand Assembled By Our Trained Technicians For Proven Reliability

When you order your Ford 9-inch 3rd member from Speedway Motors we’re not just pulling a box off the shelf and slapping a shipping label on it. Each Ford 9-inch third member is custom built to order by our fully trained differential team builders once you’ve placed your order. As a build-to-order part that does mean that there is additional time required to fill your order, though this additional time is often only two to three days at most depending upon season, parts inventory, and staffing. Getting a proper pattern on the ring gear teeth is crucial and we have the experience to do it right. Our time-proven, step-by-step process ensures the correct backlash, preload, and proper amount of pinion shims to use that ensures the correct pattern on the ring gear teeth for best operation and performance while supporting up to 1,000 horsepower. 

Final assembly includes using a lock-style pinion nut with Loctite® thread-locking compound pre-applied, high-quality Grade 5 pinion support mounting bolts, and a forged steel “Ford short” 1350-type pinion yoke. A 1350-style U-joint and U-bolt strap kit will be required to connect your driveshaft to your new 9-inch Ford center section. Each fully assembled 9-inch 3rd member ships in a sealed and reusable poly shipping case that doubles as a storage container, allowing you to store your various gear ratios easily in your shop or race trailer. These nodular iron Ford 9-inch third members feature the best of the best and are assembled with care to last no matter what you throw at it. We’re so sure of our Ford 9-inch third member quality we use the very same product in our company race cars/test vehicles. From drag and autocross to road race we race what we sell to ensure you’re getting the best product we can provide!

910-49348 Instructions (PDF)